While conversing with some people during networking events, I have come to the conclusion that people do not know the difference between “Web Design” and “Web Development”. Though both can have a mixture of similar end product (26 Things To Note Before You Develop A Website), the focus is very different. In this article, I'll discuss what both of these careers have in common and how they are different.
Web Design
Web Design focuses more on the front-end look and feel of a website. The front-end is what your visitors/users will see. It is what makes your website unique and that creativity will help users remember your business and keep them coming back for more.
If a customized website is your goal, a web designer's job is to assemble the information from the client during the consultation phase. From the client's input, a web designer will be able to visualize and describe how the website is ultimately going to look. A better overview of a designer's job is UX Is Not UI Design .
Web design elements range from color scheme (coordinating the mood of your target audience), graphics (images/logos/banners), layouts (placement of blocks on a page) and typography (fonts). There are also talented web designers who do some basic coding that makes the interaction of websites possible using jQuery, HTML5 and CSS3. However, the coding parts are usually done by the Web Developer.
Web Development
The focus of web development is the back-end features and functionality of a website. Developers make the vision of the Web Designers come to life. Web developers learned programming languages like PHP, Javascript, or ASP to create logical algorithms to make features and interactions possible.
With the invention of frameworks like Drupal/WordPress, Compass/SASS and Bootstrap, web development can be done more efficiently. Why? Presentational markup languages like HTML5 and CSS3 do not need to be manually coded every time a new page is created. Depending on the conditions discussed during the Consultation Phase, adding a new page can be as simple as clicking on a button. Adding a new feature can be done by using plugins or modules to the framework. However, these plugins and modules wouldn't be possible without the hard work of the web developers who contributed to the framework in the first place.
A Web Developer's main purpose is to make the complexity of websites as simple as possible for the end-users by automating the parts that rarely change. The parts that do change, mainly the interaction (clicks, slideshows, events, etc) and front-end look and feel of a website coming from the web designer, can be customized by the web developer who can put everything together because they understand the underlying code of the plugins/modules.
Focus On Your Business
The final product is a fully functional website that can be used by anyone without needing to know how to code. All you need is to know your business and to present the written content that describes your business to potential customers and new visitors. As they say, “content is king”. Your Web Designer and Web Developer will help you focus on writing the best content, not learning how to design and code your website. We manage that for you because we enjoy it, so you can pursue what you love to do too.
